Doug Allyn - Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 125, No. 6. Whole No. 766, June 2005

“Could be from way back, like school, or college.”

“I doubt it, unless you were in Melbourne.”

“Melbourne, Australia?” My hopes soared. If he was an Aussie, I’d nailed the lie already.

“Yep. That’s where I did my schooling. My dad worked for an Australian bank. The family moved there when I was nine years old.”

“You’re English?”

“Through and through.”

Not to be daunted, I tried another tack. “They like their sport in Australia.”

“And how,” he said.

“It’s all right if you’re athletic, but it wouldn’t do for me,” I said. “I was always last in the school cross-country.”

“If you were anything like me,” Willy said, “you stopped halfway round for a smoke. Speaking of which, do you have one on you? I left my pack in the car.”

I produced one for him.

“You’re a pal.”

“If I am,” I said, “I’m honoured.”

That first dialogue ended there because someone else needed to be introduced and we were separated. Willy waved goodbye with the fag between his fingers.

“Any clues?” Sally asked me.

“Nothing much. He grew up in Australia, but he’s English all right.”

She laughed. “That’s half of it, then. Next time, ask about the jumping.”

Willy Plumridge and his jumping interrupted my sleep that night. I woke after about an hour and couldn’t get him out of my mind. There had to be some sport that suited a stunted, barrel-like physique. I thought of ski-jumping, an event the English have never excelled at. Years ago there was all that fuss about Eddie the Eagle, that likable character who tried the jump in Calgary and scored less than half the points of any other competitor. A man of Willy’s stature would surely have attracted some attention if he’d put on skis. The thought of Willy in skin-tight Lycra wasn’t nice. It was another hour before I got any sleep.

I knew I wouldn’t relax until I’d got the answer. I called Sally next morning. “Is it possible he did winter sports?”

“Who?”

“Willy Plumridge.”

“Are you still on about him? Why don’t you look him up if you’re so bothered about this?”

“Hey, that’s an idea.”

I went to the reference library and started on the sports section, checking the names of international athletes. No Willy Plumridge. I looked at winter sports. Nothing. I tried the Internet without result.

“He’s a fraud. He’s got to be,” I told Sally when I phoned her that night. “I’ve checked every source.”

She said, “I thought you were going to look him up.”

“I did, in the library.”

“You great dummy. I meant look him up in person. He’s always in the Nag’s Head lunchtimes.”

“That figures,” I said with sarcasm. “The international athlete, knocking them back in the Nag’s Head every lunchtime.”

But I still turned up at the bar next day. Sally was right. Willy Plumridge was perched on a barstool. I suppose it made him feel taller.

“Hi, Willy,” I said with as much good humour as I could raise. “We met at Sally’s party.”

“Sure,” he said, “and I bummed a fag off you. Have one of mine.”

“What are you drinking, then?”

The stool next to him was vacant. I stood him a vodka and tonic.

“Do you work locally?” I asked.

“Work?” he said with a wide grin. “I chucked that in a long while ago.”

He was under forty. Of course, professional sportsmen make their money early in life, but they usually go into coaching later, or management. He’d made a packet if he could spend the rest of his life on a barstool.

I had an inspiration. I pictured him slimmed down and dressed in silks and a jockey cap. “Let me guess,” I said. “You were at the top of your profession. Private jet to get you around the country. Cheltenham, Newbury, Aintree.”

He laughed.

“Am I right?” I said. “Champion of the jumps?”

“Sorry to disappoint,” he said. “You couldn’t be more wrong. I wouldn’t go near a horse.”

Another theory went down the pan.

“Wouldn’t put money on one, either,” he said. “I invest in certainties. That’s how I got to retire.”

“I wish I knew your secret,” I said, meaning so much more than he knew.

“It’s simple,” he said. “I got it from my dad. Did I tell you he was in banking? He knew the way it works. He told me how to make my fortune, and I did. From time to time I top it up, and that’s enough to keep me comfortable.”

Believe it or not, I’d become so obsessed with his jumping that I wasn’t interested in how he’d made his fortune through banking. Maybe that was why he persisted with me. I was a challenge.

“If you were to ask me how I did it, I couldn’t tell you straight off,” he said. “It wasn’t dodgy. It was perfectly legit — well, almost. I’m an honest man, Michael. Thanks for the drink, but I have to be going. Next time it’s on me.”

I ran into Sally a couple of days later. She asked if I was any the wiser. I told her I was losing patience with Willy Plumridge. I didn’t believe he’d jumped for England. Ever.

“But are you getting to know him?” she asked.

“A bit. He strikes me as a bullshitter. He was on about making a fortune out of banks. No one does that without a sawn-off shotgun.”

“He’s not kidding,” she said. “He’s fabulously rich. Drives a Porsche and updates it every year. If he offers to let you in on his secret, let me know.”

“Sally, the only thing I want to know—”

“Ask him, then.”

One more possibility came to me during another disturbed night. I broached it next lunchtime in the pub. “You must have done plenty of flying in your life, Willy.”

“Enough.”

“I was wondering if you ever went in for parachuting.”

“Me? No way. What makes you think that?”

“Someone told me you were a very good jumper.”

“That?” he said with a laugh. “That wasn’t parachuting.”

“They said you jumped for England.”

“And it’s true.” He took a sip of his drink.

I waited for more and it didn’t come.

“What do you do to earn a crust, Mike?” he said.

“I’m a freelance illustrator. Kids’ books, mostly.”

“Satisfying work — but not too well-paid, I reckon.”

“That’s about right.”

“Suppose there was a way to set yourself up with a good amount of cash. Would you take it?”

“Depends,” I said. “It would have to be honest.”

“I like you,” he said, “so I’ll tell you how I made my first million. You’ve heard about Swiss bank accounts?”

“Where people salt away money with no questions asked?”

“That’s the myth. Actually, a lot of questions are asked. It’s no simple matter to open a Swiss bank account with a suitcase full of banknotes. The gnomes of Zurich have strict banking laws these days. Customers have to be identified. You have to convince the bank that what you are depositing isn’t the proceeds of a crime. Various money-laundering scandals have led to stringent legislation being introduced. These days you can’t open a numbered account, as you once could, without identifying yourself. The beneficial owners of accounts have to be declared. As they should.”

“Agreed,” I said, uncertain where this was leading.

“They’ve also tightened up on withdrawals. The whole point of using Switzerland is that every account is rigidly protected. Great-Uncle Edward dies and leaves you everything and there’s a rumour that he was stashing away money in a Swiss account. Can you find out from the bank? No. All you get is a petrifying glare and a reminder that they are bound by their banking codes. In another twenty years, the bank can claim the money. There are said to be tens of billions locked away in dormant accounts in Switzerland. The gnomes bide their time and then collect.”